Decade
by Archaeobee
Summary: “Every king needs a queen.” His eyes, inky black in the light of a few drooping candles, are fixed on the corner of her mouth, which always seems to reply before the rest of her. JxE, POSTAWE, SPOILERS.
1. I

**Author's Note: **This will probably end up without about three or four vignette-type chapters, following the characters' lives over the ten years immediately following the latest film. Again, many lovely spoilers for AWE.

_Decade  
_By Dream Descends

۞

I.

It's been more or less three years when the _Pearl_ is blown off course to a small islet, just south of nowhere-in-particular. It's more a sandbar than a landmass, but the docks are crowded with curious inhabitants when they make port. Jack finds his way easily (as he always does) through the local market, nodding politely at the frantic flailing of live fish and raw sugar for sale. He's grinning enthusiastically at the rather clumsy hand that evidently took several hundred yards of yarn to task with a knitting needle, when _she_ glances up from her stool.

Her squashed boy's cap, jammed awkwardly over a grubby head of flaxen hair, does little for the sharp angles of the face he well remembers. Her lips ruck slightly at the corners, but her eyes stay carefully flat as she rests her latest woolly venture in her lap.

"Not my size," he explains, returning the disfigured garment in his hand to its place on her cart.

"Not your price range, either, I expect," she quips, smiling openly.

He notices her knuckles are white, and his own fingers flex on impulse. "Decidedly not."

Quite abruptly she drops her knitting, a practise too preposterously simple for her mind in any case, and stands in her homely skirts to face him. "_Jack_," she exclaims, at least half pleased.

As he bows flourishingly, a shining head of brown curls appears at her side. "Yes, mama?"

۞

Her apartments are small; two rooms above the town's only tavern, with a rent that makes Jack wince. Young Jackie, a name the boy takes to immediately, spends the majority of his time in Jack's company eyeing the pirate nervously from across the room. Elizabeth puts him to bed just when it's getting interesting.

"'S a bit of a large name for a lad so small, innit?" Jack spies through the bedroom door as Elizabeth's son sleeps in the next room.

She follows Jack's gaze, eyes misting over as she wipes clean the insides of two mugs. "He'll grow into it."

"Jack James William Weatherby Turner? Often give birth to giants, love?" He sits down across from her at the rickety kitchen table, watching her movements under the pretense of staring out the clouded window. She's changed little, save the weariness that makes each gesture less graceful than he remembers. "How'd yours truly end up first, anyhow?"

She meets his evocative gaze squarely, which he enjoys. It's not often he has the pleasure of being seen through. Her reply comes after a brief pause. "The alphabet."

He picks up the offered drink but doesn't sample it. "I might've known."

She observes his hesitance. "It's juice, Jack."

He gives her a blank look.

۞

Sundown comes on quicker than they both expect. There are no words, but Elizabeth's breath catches just as the last dollop of light leaves the horizon. Jack feigns mental occupation, intentionally _not_ seeing the weight disappointment has on her eyes and the breadth of her shoulders. He doesn't think about what another seven years might do.

Off shore, the _Pearl_ is stowing canvas, settling in for the night, as her store of captains is in short supply.

"Come with me."

The proposition is rather more blunt than he had planned it to sound, but he imagines it gets the point across.

She tilts her head to the side, calling his bluff. "And Jackie?"

He smiles delightedly at the prospect. "For his own good."

A soft sleepy noise in the other room keeps the pirate's voice to a whisper. "Every king needs a queen." His eyes, inky black in the light of a few drooping candles, are fixed on the corner of her mouth, which always seems to reply before the rest of her.

It twitches. Her long arm reaches across the table and her fingers hover thoughtfully over the brand on his forearm. "You'll be my queen, Jack?" She asks teasingly, though she's not.

His gaze flickers from the place where her hand near meets his skin to the restored flush of her cheeks. He pulls out his compass and drops it into her expectant palm.


	2. II

_Decade: II  
_By Dream Descends

۞

"_Where's west, Master Turner!_"

Elizabeth's eyes narrow against the noontime sun, which crests over two contrasting figures manning the fo'c'sle. Her hands relax briefly on the tarpaulin she's mending.

"_Where's north, Master Turner!_"

The smaller of the two individuals raises an unsteady hand above his head, which seems to gesture undecidedly for a moment, and then points firmly in a direction that's by her eye not in any reasonable margin of error to be mistaken for _north_.

She mounts the steps two at a time, her boots still squelching with rainwater from the previous night, and kneels by her son. The taller man raises an irked eyebrow, but says nothing.

"Jackie," she starts tentatively. "Can you—how are you getting along?" She looks up, faltering. "Is he—alright?"

"Certain', ma," the boy exclaims before his company can reply, though his wide eyes only briefly glance at her. He knows well as her that she's not meant to interrupt.

The compass, large enough that he has to cup it in both palms, is thrust in front of her. "The arrow points north," he recites plainly.

She begins to nod, then stops. The hand on her son's arm tightens and then her fingers splay outward as though burned.

"Jack." Her voice is low and even before her son.

The captain pauses and lowers his eyeglass, grinning as though in surprise. "Why, Mother Turner."

"Was the compass I gave him not suitable, or were you simply curious?" The smirk tugging at his lips is because of her temper, and she knows this; she can't stop. "He's barely four, you indomitable wretch—can't I leave him alone with you _for a moment_—he doesn't need to—"

"Darling, you're _not_ curious?" He turns back to his eyeglass but her hand on his wrist stops him. She snatches his unwanted contribution from her young boy's hands and shoves it frigidly back into those of its owner.

The day is warm and there's a fair wind, but suddenly she's on edge. "No." Her eyes are flat as she replies to what is meant as a rhetorical question, and it's a strange sour sort of pleasure she takes in the way his movements shudder with surprise. "Not any more."

He holds the thing between them for a moment, eyeing it as distastefully as she might, and she's taken aback at how abruptly stiff he's gone. Then with a snap, the telltale black case is closed before she can see in what direction the arrow now points.

There's a palpable silence between them, drowning out Jackie's tuneless humming "He's not _barely_ four, Elizabeth," Jack murmurs finally. "How old're you now, son?"

"Four and three months," Jackie pipes up eagerly, taking hold of his mother's pant leg. "Can I 'ave th' compass back?"

"_May_ I," she corrects gently. "Some other day, perhaps."

۞

Their arrival in Shipwreck Cove is unheralded, and from the poorly concealed shock on the brethren's faces, rather more than unwanted. She can't entirely blame them—Jack's idea of a greeting is to march directly into the conference, eyes flashing and flintcocks held high. He's not a violent man by nature, preferring to talk his way out of the trouble he's often caught in, but Elizabeth has never seen one man command a room full of criminals and warriors like he does then.

"Didn't think to invite us, lads?" He inquires amiably, and the curdling of each expression at the table only makes him grin.

"_C__rétin_ 'E 'as always 'ad such luck!"

Elizabeth steps into view, and instinctively raises her chin a few inches higher. The indignant Frenchman and his companions blanch at the sight of their king.

"_Quel dommage_," Jack supplies merrily.

۞

Pirates don't have the stamina to hold a grudge and drink at the same time, Jack tells her before, and of course he's right. Once the Pearl's cache of wines and rum is employed, even Chevalle resentfully inclines his head as Elizabeth joins the chairing lord at the head of the table.

"Mutiny becomes you, Captain." Her tone is light, knowing the man long enough to understand his views on enduring positions of leadership. "Jack was evidently speaking prematurely when addressing you as the _late_ Hector Barbossa."

"A tad, Highness." He agrees. "And 't weren't but some light-hearted treason, t' be sure. How were any o' the kindly folk here to know ye planned on livin' up to the title after all these years?"

She bridles a little at that, though she's not wont to discover why. "I'm here now, aren't I?"

"And not alone, I'm come to understand."

The thought of her son brings up a smile, but she's distracted when Jack calls for a game of cards. Expectantly she gets to her feet—he'll lose half their prize money if they're not both at the table.

۞

There's more of a convivial temper among the court when Elizabeth finally concedes to bring Jackie ashore, and not before she's checked twice that every man (or lady) is happily inebriated. A sober pirate is usually up to no good—a drunk one is as well, but with a much lower rate of success.

His palms are sweaty when they enter the room, and for a moment there's only silence. The disquieting feeling of being examined makes him cower into her side, but then Jack raises a hand in a lazy wave and there's a great cry of welcome.

There are still those, though, even as he joins a table and grins toothily at the bizarre faces around him, that Elizabeth catches studying the lad with a speculative frown, a question in their stare that's darker than she likes. She subtly tries to call Jack's attention to it but, whether it be the drink or his own turbulent moods, he's uncharacteristically oblivious.

۞

The raucous crowing of laughter and content mutterings of a satiated party finally draw to a close as the night's nearly spent. The sky's already red with the coming sun when Elizabeth carries Jackie back down to the docks where the _Pearl_ has been patiently waiting. The crew is slumbering noisily after an evening's revelry and Elizabeth puts him to bed in the Captain's quarters instead.

"He's perfect' welcome t' the couch, 'Lizbeth," Jack slurs rather indignantly, watching as she tucks the boy into the great four-poster bed.

"But that's not nearly as comfortable." She smirks as Jack eyes the piece of furniture unpleasantly, clearly in agreement.

As he grudgingly settles in for the night, Elizabeth kneels next to her son in his sleep, gently tracing the bridge of his nose and the slope of each cheek. "Jack?"

"Me or 'im?" The elder replies, sounding annoyed.

"You—"

"As I suspected," he groans, and tilts his hat up a bit. "You forgot the 'captain'."

Barely hearing this, she continues. "Why were they all looking at him oddly tonight?"

She hears nothing, and then the rustling of fabric against fabric. One boot touches the floor quietly. "How d'you mean, love?"

She glances back over her shoulder and Jack's looking up at the ceiling. "Like he was a piece of meat. Like they were hunting for something—a secret." She rubs her legs up and down thoughtfully. "Not his secret."

"It's natural nosiness," he replies, closing his eyes again. "Pirates gossip as much as your former _powdered wig_ legion; they're only wondering about their next fearsome king."

"Gossip," she parrots doubtfully, and in the ensuing hush something occurs to her. "So many of them asked his age."

"Aye?" Jack mumbles, uninterested.

"They asked after Will."

Finally the pirate props himself up with his elbows. "Is there something you're wanting very badly to discuss, Elizabeth, or is this your usual attempt at amiable discourse in _ungodly_ hours of the morning?"

She moves from a crawl into a full stride and takes a seat cross-legged in the chair across from him. "You know the rumours. You hear their whispers, Jack—no doubt feed them just as much. What're they saying about Jackie?"

"You'd come across as utterly difficult and thoroughly distrustful to someone who didn't know you well, Lizzie." He's being deliberately evasive and she hopes like hell he'll stop soon so she doesn't have to resort to yelling, and waking Jackie.

"Don't be so goddamn mysterious, Jack," she growls, throwing a little hand-mirror sitting on the tea table at him to get his attention. He catches it neatly with one hand.

"Seven years of us never winning at cards," he scolds her.

"_Me_ never winning at cards."

He grins at that. "Seven years of _me_ never enjoying _you_ winning at cards."

"Tell me what they're saying, Jack."

He tosses the mirror back onto the table and leans back, crossing his arms. Elizabeth knows how to recognize his anger, though he never likes to obviously express it. The cold front he gives her now is a warning, but she's too worked up to pay it any heed.

"Why're you always chasing what makes you unhappy," he remarks flatly—it's not a question.

"Why're you acting like my father," she retorts caustically, some part of her knowing she sounds foolish. "I don't need you to protect me."

Jack doesn't blink but the steadiness in his glare dies outs, and he transfers his gaze to the one boot dirtying the end of the couch. His head tilts as though he's not sure he's heard right.

When he replies, his voice is a shade darker, rougher; it's as it rarely is. Honest. "They say he's ours."

She's furious almost before he says it and he can see that, and so he doesn't try to stop her when she storms out. She slams the doors behind her without thinking, realizing only too late and with little regret that she's probably woken the small form in the bed. Her ears ring and her cheeks are on fire; she can't help hearing what even Jack's not brave enough to utter.

_He should be. _


	3. III

_Decade: III  
_By Dream Descends

۞

Shipwreck's green craggy bluffs are glowing in the heat of the late afternoon. Jackie Turner scales the crumbling rock with all the nimbleness of youth, bright-faced, tongue protruding in deep concentration.

"Lookee, boy," a gravely voice comes from above. His escort's head appears over the gentle incline of the precipice, the deep lines of his face stretched in a rare smile.

"Captain?" He's breathless and, though he wouldn't admit it, rather afraid of looking anywhere but at the tops of his feet.

"To th' west. A ship."

The thrill is so unexpected Jackie near loses his grip and, embarrassingly, cries out in alarm. A steady hand grasps his wrist and hauls him back onto even land. "S'a fool thing to do," Teague mutters, shoving the boy's hat unceremoniously back onto his head. "Don't recommend falling off cliffs."

Jackie stares agog at the older man.

The pirate raises his eyebrows, swaying a bit as he reaches for the flask on his belt. "Well, go on." He gestures in the general direction of the cove. "Off, now."

The boy races off, and after a drink, Teague follows.

۞

Elizabeth spreads her arms as her son careens onto the wharf. The force of his small body is more welcome than painful, but still she detaches his clinging hands more quickly than usual. "You've grown," she laughs, pretending to measure him against her side. "A near foot, I'd say."

He beams appreciatively, his hair (which really _has_ grown) clinging to the sweat of his rounded cheeks. "Hello, ma—mother."

She smiles slightly at the gravity of his tone. He's become a more quiet and pensive boy than she expected, but it doesn't worry her as often as it might—she remembers Will was just the same. "It's good to see you," she murmurs, and briefly embraces him again.

"He's in one piece." She looks up in time to see Teague's short nod of greeting. "And you might s'well know the _Pearl_ made port, 'bout a fortnight ago."

"Yes!" The boy exclaims, a rare thing in and of itself. He pulls away to look eagerly up at his mother, and she knows he wants to be the first to break the news. "Uncle Jack's come to visit, ma—mother." She gives him the smile he's expecting and he returns it.

"That's wonderful, Jackie," she agrees, but the smile dies quickly when he turns away.

۞

"Jack?" The heady smell of old timber is comforting and familiar, but the rooms seem oddly vacant. It's unquestionably been lived in; the candles are gutted and the bed sheets unmade, but the activity is old. When she looks closely she sees a fine layer of dust covering the bureau, the trunk—all mismatched furniture. She stares at it a little longer. All stolen.

A sitting room is attached—the remnants of a wreck's great cabin, furnished with only a writing table, a settee, and a vastly inaccurate globe. She takes a few steps. "Jack?"

The sight of him is startlingly painful, as though something's just jabbed the fresh stitches in her side. He looks up from his charts, compass in hand, and the upward curve of his mouth is not a smile. "Lizzie." Her own fascination irritates her; what does she care for his shoulders, his jaw line, the shape of his voice?

"How nice of you to come see us," she says keenly, after a pause. It's inadequate but sincere, and she knows he knows. "Jackie's missed you."

"Safe to say he's the first." He gestures to the bottles, in varying degrees of emptiness, littering his desk. "Might I offer you a drink, your nibs?"

"You might," she agrees politely, and reaches out.

"Just choose one," he tells her, flapping a hand at them without glancing up. "And sit out of reach of any live flame or combustible substance, if you please."

She smiles unwillingly and takes a bottle, easing onto the settee.

"Are you here for long?"

He pauses, as though for thought, and then goes back to his maps. "My visit ends within the week, m'afraid. A shame, what with you only just arriving."

"Yes," she says quickly. "Yes, it is."

He grins, knowing she knows he knows she's lying. "Now, let's be honest, love."

She protests, merely out of ritual, but he brushes her rebuttals aside.

"And how are you finding captaincy—once again?"

She shrugs, watching him mark up his maps with an odd looping script that's utterly _him_. "I don't like being away from Jackie for so long. Two months, this time…it was too much."

"S'why I don't have children."

"You've a nephew, though, that might like seeing more of you."

He smiles humourlessly. "Will Turner was not my brother, love, and his son is every reminder of that."

She bristles at his dismissal, Jackie's vibrant face coming to the front of her mind. "And so you claim no attachment to the boy at all?"

Jack cocks his head, and for the first time it strikes Elizabeth that he might be as angry as she. "I was given the impression that was what _you_ wanted, darling."

She sputters in disbelief. "Were you? And by who?" When he simply stares at her, she growls, "Don't amuse yourself by me, not when you presume to call yourself an honest man."

He's at last looking mildly offended, even though she's insulted him and at some point risen off her chair and planted her palms on either side of his damned_ maps_. He's forced to meet her there, forced to lie to her face if he insists upon it.

"A man knows when he's unsought, love," he murmurs, and dares to turn away.

"Clearly not," she snarls, and grabbing his chin between her thumb and forefinger, she kisses him.

The ferocity and nerve are rather lost in her sudden uncertainty in what she's doing—she hadn't meant for this, not this at all, but he's—yes, he's kissing back and her body is coiled like a furious spring, remembering all the days and years it's been.

She's lost the control as soon as she's shown it off. Her knees that have climbed onto the table of their own accord are hooked forward by his hands, in a loud rush of parchment and torn fabric, and she thinks she might hear glass break, but he's gone on kissing her so it's no matter. He's rough and still angry and even slightly rude; his hand has curled into a fist around the hair at her neck, but more to keep her there than for anything else. His other arm is wound around her leg, pulling her right against him and his fingers cinching her waist—

She cries out. He stops suddenly. "Stitches," she gasps, and two pairs of trembling hands lift her shirt to reveal the livid red line that claws down her side.

The way he stares at it has her white with fear. _Don't leave_, she pleads silently, _don't stop_.

"I don't care," she insists, trying to pull the fabric back down. "It doesn't matter."

He pulls her hands away, gently but firmly, chiding her, "Lizzie." He lifts the shirt again, but he keeps going, and he doesn't move away. His eyes are dark. "I care," he mutters.

Her chest aches, and she realizes she's not breathing. As an afterthought, she helps him push the garment off her head, almost scrambling and then utterly still.

He takes both her hands and puts them 'round his neck, her cool fingers flaring over the heat. She clings to him.

۞

She can't tell what sweat is hers and what is his.

۞

The gutted candles have now collapsed entirely in wide pools of soft wax. He dips his finger in one and runs it down the trough between her breasts and over the rise of each rib.

"Jack."

He hushes her.

"Jack, there's something—"

A crunch, a hiss of pain.

"Oh. _Oh_—the ink pot—Jack—oh, hell, it's all over…"

"The charts, love."

She cries out wordlessly, trying to sit up. "_Jack!_" She struggles against him, uselessly. "They'll all be ruined." She looks at him from flat on her back.

"All _are_ ruined," he corrects, a corner of his mouth turning into a grin. In the dark she can only feel it. "Very much ruined."

"I…"

"S'alright, love. I considered that earlier and decided the pros devastatingly slaughtered the cons."

Her protests weaken a great deal at that. "But, the places…it's the only…"

"There'll be others. We'll plot our own if need be. If you're done fussing, highness."

She nods speechlessly, obediently, and he kisses her smile until it turns into a laugh and he can't hold her still. "I'll miss dinner," she complains, pressing a hand to her empty stomach.

Jack stops at that, and she imagines the demented cogs of his mind turning in the silence. Suddenly she's surrounded by cold and he's not with her any more. She sits up, trying not to sound anxious. "Jack?"

The room is flooded with light, forcing her to squint. His narrow, naked form is outlined in the open doorway. "_Jack?_"

She scrambles for something to cover herself with as he disappears into the corridor. A strange sort of nausea is building in her throat and she's ashamed to hear the quiver in her voice as she calls for him again and again. Her shirt and breeches are back on in a hurry and she's stumbling out of the room after him, between laughter and tears.

He's coming towards her with a Spanish salver, burdened with food still steaming and unprepared from the kitchens—chicken breast and bright red tomatoes and half a loaf of bread and one _whole_ papaya and—she clutches the doorframe.

He stops to look her over and his brows draw together. "You're dressed," he points out, sounding disappointed.

"You're not," comes her incredulous reply.

"Well spotted," he agrees solemnly.

۞

The moon's waning in a dawn of cold purple when she leaves his cabin. The fresh dampness of the outside air makes her pause in drowsy surprise—there's been rain in the past few hours. In the glowing lamplight of the harbour, she sees her flagship, a neat little sloop, shining wet. Unwillingly her mind turns to business; fresh caulk and tar on deck before noon, to prevent water damage…perhaps they'll finally replacing the decaying halyards…

Her gaze moves from her own ship to another a few hundred yards away, anchored nearer to the concealed channel that leads to open sea. Its telltale black canvas is stowed, to her secret relief. Part of her expects to see it already in full sail and exiting the bay, with Jack waving a merry goodbye from the helm. But he's still in his cabin sleeping (if one could call his restless writhing and incessant muttering sleep), and there's no pair of hands on his crew yet sober enough to tell bow from stern.

When there is, she might then attempt to fathom an appropriate goodbye.

۞

**Author's Note:** Yes, I know. It has been an unprecedented amount of time since I last updated, and I am an awful, awful person for being so lazy. Any apology I can think of won't do the laziness justice, so I'll just hope for your kind forgiveness. Don't worry, there will be one more chapter, I wouldn't leave anyone with an ending like this; I'm not particularly happy with this chapter at all but the plumbing of my creative sensibility is all clogged up for some reason. I will honestly, with all my brain, try to make the final chapter better than than this one, and make it happen a bit quicker too.


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